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Comment by slwvx | Hacker News Reader

One place to look for some math on the economic efficiencies is the blog of Terraform industries. Here's a start:

https://terraformindustries.wordpress.com/2024/04/01/terrafo...

> There is no hand waving about economies of scale or subsidies here, though we are eligible for the full IRA 45V green hydrogen tax credit, worth $3/kg-H2.

Their business model may have a slight problem.

They're saying that they don't need the green hydrogen tax credit. The tax credit makes their product profitable sooner, but as long as solar keeps following it's cost curve for a couple more years they'll be fine without it.

> Their business model may have a slight problem.

Oil is subsidized to a much higher amount by the US government

Subsidized in what way? I've heard many dubious things in the UK / EU called "fossil fuel subsidies" when it's mostly generic things like electricity having a lower VAT rate than the usual 20% (or whatever) on most consumer goods. This is the sort of thing that gets called a fossil fuel subsidy. I think a lot of these things are grasping at straws.

The top subsidy of fuels that emit carbon emissions is the externalities experienced by future generations. Not really measured in numbers, it will just be a change in quality of life.

That is an extremely interesting and potent way of phrasing it - thank you!

Yeah, but that subsidy is not likely to disappear in 2 months.

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